Time
by RaspberryBloodTablets
Summary: Set at the end of the anime. What does Éclair feel? Was she only using Tamaki, or did she really love him? A glimpse into Éclair's head, where the clock is always ticking away the seconds until she won't have to be alone anymore. Oneshot.


Well, this is what happens when you are procrastinating and not writing your history term paper/essay/thing on Korean War-based thesis statements. Well, at least this is what happens if you're me. But I don't think you want to be right about now...

Anyway, so I was watching the last episode of (the English dub of) the _Ouran_ anime for the hundredth-thousandth time (while procrastinating), and all of a sudden, I stopped my TamakixHaruhi fangirling, and I thought: _What about __É__clair? What happens to her now? What happened to her _BEFORE_?_

And thus, this beast was born. Feel free to give feedback, even if you don't like it. This was just an exercise to see if I could stretch my creative muscles by trying to give a deep voice to a character that I dislike. Although, it seems to me, that if I focus hard enough, I have a little Éclair inside of me. I think everyone does. She is that little insecurity that holds you back and makes you wonder: _Was I never really good enough for that person? Am I good enough for anyone?_ And I think that that's inside everybody somewhere, it is just more noticeable in some people. I'll stop rambling on now. Did I mention that I am both caffeine high and sleep deprived, as am procrastinating? Yeah. Fun.

Please enjoy, and thanks so much for reading. Sorry if this doesn't make any sense.

Also, please feel free to check out my other _Ouran_ fic, _Cantarella_.

**EDIT NOTE:** _All Italics are flashbacks._

**ANOTHER EDIT:** I have replaced the content of this story after taking out a few atrocious misspellings. The story itself was not altered though, don't worry. Thanks for all the kind reviews, people!_  
_

So anyway, **I do not claim to own _Ouran_**. It belongs to **Bisco Hatori** and **Studio BONES**.

* * *

**_Time_**

_Fairytales don't exist. Really._

Éclair Tonnerre knew that better than almost anyone, because when all was said and done, she was the one left alone on the bridge. Fairytales always ended happily ever after, and her story was nothing like that.

Éclair's first real memory was the ticking of a clock, it echoed through the rooms of her empty home, the main Tonnerre estate in France. Of course, the Tonnerre estate wasn't really empty, it was full of staff and furniture and light. But Éclair's parents were never there, so it might as well have been empty, the way she saw it.

It was because they never had the _time_ for her. Éclair didn't know what to think of that, her only definition of the word _time_ being an endless ticking that filled up the silence in her head, as she stood motionless at the door, waiting for them to come home. Waiting for a real family.

Then, one day when Éclair was thirteen years old, someone arrived on her family's estate. A new housekeeper. The golden woman.

In general, the staff seemed like a blur of faces and voices to Éclair, dozens of paper dolls, each the same as the last.

Until _her_. The wonderful house keeper who had radiant golden curls spilling down her back. Who had luminescent lavender eyes. Who always had a far-away smile.

Éclair would talk to her sometimes. That was the only time that she was unable to hear the clock ticking.

* * *

_"Why would you ever become a housekeeper?"_

_"Whatever do you mean, Lady __É__clair?"_

_"You're so pretty, couldn't you be an actress or something? Why would you work in a place like this?"_

_"I've done things that I can't forgive myself for, I'll stay hiding here until I can find a way to fix things."_

_"What things?" asked Eclair, curious now._

_"Why, aren't you full of questions today." said the woman, smiling._

_"Forgive me, but I find it hard to believe that someone such as yourself has led a dull life. I am curious about the world outside of these walls."_

_

* * *

_Éclair had never gotten much of a chance to leave he home. Whenever she did, the press would simply follow her everywhere, wanting to know all they could about the young heiress to the Tonnerre family.

* * *

_"I have a son."_

_"What?"_

_"I said I have a son, only a year older than you."_

_"Is he kind?"_

_"Very much so. He used to play the piano for me when I was ill. He was the dearest person to me in the world."_

_

* * *

_To hear a parent speak so fondly of their child, caused a small thorn of jealousy to grow within Éclair's heart.

* * *

_"Where is he?"_

_"With his father. In Japan."_

_"Will he ever come to visit you?" asked __É__clair, wanting to know if there was a chance she could meet the son of the golden woman._

_"No."_

_"What... What is his name?"_

_"His name is Tamaki."_

_

* * *

__É__clair Tonnerre, age sixteen. Packing her bags for Japan._

_"What are these?"_

_"Antique opera glasses from when I was younger. I want you to have them __É__clair."_

_"Why?"_

_"Take them with you. The will help you find him."_

_"Miss... How would you feel, if he were to come live here?"_

_"I miss my son, truly. But I would _never _want to make him leave behind those who he loves."_

_

* * *

_The thing is, most fairytales dissolve at the stroke of midnight. Her's never even lasted that long.

_"Come on Tamaki, you couldn't possible have feelings for a _shrew_ like that, could you?"_

_"My lady, I would prefer that you do not refer to my little girl as a shrew!" he said, turning to face her._

_"'Your little girl'. They _aren't_ your real family Tamaki. So stop playing house."_

_She pulled him onto the plush sofa, with more force than she knew she was capable of._

_"What are you doing?"_

_She leaned close to him, close enough that he could smell the scent of her shampoo, a rich citrus-y smell, with a hint of chocolate. He instantly recognized it as Swiss Orange, one of his mother's favorite scents._

_"They aren't your family, so wouldn't you rather have the real thing? Because _I _ can give it to you, you know..."_

_And she brushed her lips against his, ever so gently, and whispered the words that would ultimately fuel every decision Tamaki within the next forty-eight hours._

_"You're just as your mother described you to be. Truly amazing."_

_"My... mother?"_

_"Yes, I can take you back to her on one condition."_

_"Anything."_

_There was no hesitation in his voice._

_"Marry me." she whispered, leaning in to kiss him fully. She kissed him again and again, and truly felt like crying. He had completely destroyed the time ticking away, the endless sound that was always in conjunction with her calm heartbeat._

_He made her blood race. It set her free from the horrible curse of the ticking clock.  
_

_

* * *

_"Go on ahead." she told her driver.

The convertible pulled away from it's spot on the bridge.

"Miss Éclair, you have heard the stories that the housekeeper tells back home, correct? The one's about her her son who loved to play the piano for her?"

"Yes, I have."

And she closed her eyes, and let the tears fall down her face as they sped away, because the moment Tamaki had jumped, it had resumed.

The endless ticking, telling her that she was alone.

* * *

_"Thanks, __É__clair."_

_

* * *

_"But even for someone like me... He still _smiled_."

The fairytale was over, she would go back home to that noisy echoing, trapped behind the walls of that house.

She would tell the golden woman about her son, and about why she never brought back the opera glasses. The ones that sat on the cobblestone of the bridge, millions of miles away, in the land of fairytales and endings.

* * *

**_Fin._**

**_

* * *

_**Thank you for reading! Wow, I got a little "Horizontal Ruler" happy with this. Hope it was okay. I can barely keep my eyes ope, and I think they may start bleeding.

-RaspberryBloodTablets


End file.
